News Comment/COMENTARI AL DIA

The Charterhouse of Catalonia/LA CARTOIXA DE CATALUNYA

The Charterhouse of Catalonia

by Josep C. Verges

Prima de la Rivoluzione, the Bertolucci film based on a contemporary Charterhouse of Parma. Below: Rajoy look-alike Philip II.

“The Charterhouse of Parma” begins with a typical Stendhalian portrait of the centuries-long Spanish occupation of Milan and the Lombardy: “They lived immersed in a dark night because of the continuation of the jealous despotism of Charles V and Philip II. When their statues were pulled down they found themselves suddenly flooded with light. ” The Charterhouse of Catalonia will also demolish the statues of the black night. The Catalan vote on Europe will confirm in the light of day that the Spanish despotism of the PP and PSOE that controls everything in Madrid is just a tiny minority in Catalonia.

Stendhal explained in greater detail in his guide “Rome, Naples and Florence” written in 1826, 12 years before “The Charterhouse of Parma, why the Spaniards, as he called the Castilians were not at home in Italy: “In some very noble and ancient families I have seen some details that still reflect the Spanish customs that have long oppressed and polluted this beautiful country with the infamous government of Philip II. This execrable prince and his successors are responsible for all the ills of Italy and the general stupidity that has succeeded the laurels they showed before in all genres. The Italian character was crushed by the enormous mass of the tyranny, the most suspicious, the weakest, the most ruthless. Extreme distrust rendered indispensable the spies and tyrants in the petty image of Philip II. The Spaniards, who were not in their home, were engaged as the agents of the vigorous despotism when not playing the guitar under the window of the Italian belles. They lost Italy and lost Italy by degrading it.” Stendhal contrasts the Napoleonic Code with the “atrocious laws of Charles V and Philip II. The influence of Napoleon overturned Spanish ideas, but even though the remedy was energetic, it proved too little.” Only a Frenchman can admire Napoleon, but in our country, so to speak, Spanish nationalists admire the Constitution of the State of Autonomies as if it were Napoleon’s mausoleum, all glacial marble. This untouchable ,uncriticisable and unbearable Constitution iwas born as a pact between despotism in power and the democracy the people demanded. The compromise between Spaniards and Catalans is as dead as Napoleon after the Constitutional Court, the fourth non-democratic chamber of the PP and PSOE, tore apart in 2010 the Catalan Statute voted by Parliament, by Congress and by the people in a referendum. If democracy does not serve to keep the covenants and obligations established by the triple vote of the people and their representatives in Catalonia and Madrid, the Spanish Constitution is just as useless. The problem is not Catalan but Spanish, because Catalonia can not be controlled with despotism. Spanish nationalists will have expelled Catalonia from Spain. The Charterhouse of Catalonia has the right to vote and the European elections will reflect what Catalanswe want. How can Spain prevent the same referendum Scotland will have done two months earlier? By banning Catalan parties? By occupying Catalonia to prevent a declaration of independence? Or by learning to respect the Charterhouse of Catalonia, in or out of Spain? Madrid football club has a very good Italian coach despite having lost Italy through their own incompetence. Is it not the same incompetence of the PP and the PSOE destroying in the black of night the Catalan Statute and provoking the march of Catalonia towards the light?